The subject matter herein relates generally to crimp tooling for terminal crimping machines for crimping electrical terminals to a wire.
Terminal crimping machines have long been used in the connector industry to effect high-speed mass termination of various cables. It is common practice for the terminal crimping machine to have an interchangeable tooling assembly called an applicator. In general, such terminal crimping machines are referred to as a terminator or press; however, other types of terminal crimping machines may similarly be used, such as a lead maker, a bench machine, or a hand crimping tool. The terminal crimping machines include crimp tooling, such as an anvil and a wire crimper attached to movable ram that is moved relative to the anvil during a crimping stroke to crimp a terminal or connector to an end of a wire. The wire is typically held by a wire clamp during the crimping operation.
However, these known terminal crimping machines are not without disadvantages. For instance, the wire crimper may be slightly offset relative to the anvil during crimping. The offset may lead to poorly crimped terminals, such as due to flashing of the terminal during crimping or mis-forming of the terminal. In some instances, the offset may cause damage to the wire crimper or the anvil.
A need remains for a terminal crimping machine that accommodates and corrects mis-alignment of the wire crimper and the anvil.